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OVERVIEW

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Brief Synopsis

At the end of World War II, at a ceremony on the White House lawn, four survivors of a submarine downed in the Pacific receive the Congressional Medal of Honor. As they accept the award, they recall the mission and their compatriots who died in battle: In such close quarters, the men onboard the submarine, Clayton Shepherd, Buck Clayton, former baseball pitcher Speed Brogan, Pete Lubowsky, Eddie Jones, Charlie Anderson, gambler "Ten-to-One" Ryan and American Indian Mike Rawhide, quickly get to know one another. One day, Captain Faversham receives orders to pick up Lt. Ito Kaida, a Korean American intelligence officer, who has completed his mission to infiltrate North Korea. Faversham then instructs First Officer Ross to begin their journey to the Korean shore. After tripping over one of the submarine's torpedoes and spraining his pitching arm, Speed decides to call the torpedo "Jonah" and says that it is jinxed. Later, in the radio room, Ten-to-One intercepts a radio transmission announcing that the Japanese have just surrendered. The men are ecstatic and after some loud cheering, one of them spots a Japanese battleship nearby. When they signal to the ship, it responds with torpedo fire. Faversham returns fire, but also misses, and when the ship approaches them, he orders a steep descent. He then tells his men to send up an oil slick so that the ship will think that they have been hit. After the ship departs, Faversham tells the men that he must follow through with his orders until they are officially canceled. When the submarine nears the beach where they are to meet Kaida, Shepherd is selected for the dangerous raft landing. Kaida is successfully rescued and tells Faversham that the fanatical crew of a Japanese aircraft carrier has vowed to resist surrender. They learn that General Douglas MacArthur will be accepting the surrender onboard the S.S. Missouri , which is anchored in Tokyo Bay. Faversham tries desperately to radio the message to MacArthur, but a kamikaze pilot attacks, shooting off their antenna before the message is sent. When Faversham opens the hatch and climbs on top of the submarine to try to fix the antenna, he is shot and killed. Ross then takes command and decides to fire "Jonah" at the aircraft carrier. The torpedo, however, is never launched, but becomes stuck in the hull of their submarine. After they sustain a hit from the aircraft carrier, the men discover that the submarine is taking on water. Then, when poisonous chlorine gas begins leaking into the submarine, the men nearly choke to death. Ross decides that the only way they can deliver "Jonah" is to charge the aircraft carrier and ram it at full speed. They get the submarine up to speed, and the men jump off just before it hits the aircraft carrier and causes a terrific explosion. Before he abandons ship, Shepherd manages to shoot a kamikaze pilot, who is spraying the water with bullets. Although most of the men are killed by the kamikaze gunfire, Ross, Shepherd, Mike and Eddie survive. Back at the White House, these brave men accept the military's highest honor.